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Mass Effect 2: Final Moments (part 2)

The following topics are my interpretations of my Mass Effect experience, they should not be taken as fact and are simply here to provide you with some context for the video. I believe most the information presented here is correct, however I could be wrong! But once again, for the purpose of acting as context for the video you are about to see, they should be perfectly valid.

This information is also, obviously, filled with spoilers regarding Mass Effect 1 and 2. However if you only plan on playing 3, it shouldn’t really affect you that much.

Shepard – Mass Effect’s main character, the character the player controls, can be either male or female and his face is completely customizable. The reason most players use the default Shepard skin is out of respect for the story and because it doesn’t really look that bad either.
Shepard dies at the start of Mass Effect 2 and disappears for 2 years.

Tali’Zorah – A Quarian (Alien race) Tech expert. She wears a Bio-suit because Quarian immune systems work differently from other species. Due to the nature of their homeworld which always provided beneficial micro-organisms, their immune systems learned to absorb other micro-organisms into their body instead of fighting them. (Tali was a part of Shepard’s crew in Mass Effect 1)

Miranda – A Cerberus Operative involved in the operation to ‘reconstruct’ Shepard, she is a genetically engineered human, victim of multiple experiments by her ‘father’, which is the reason she ran to Cerberus. She is a natural, cold, leader.

Garrus – An Ex-Citadel-Security officer. Garrus left C-Sec to join up with Shepard in Mass Effect 1. He hates the limitations of being a by-the-book law enforcer and favors the enforcement style of a Vigilante. In Mass Effect 2 Shepard meets up with him on Omega, and recruits him back to the team.

Legion – A Geth Unit. Apparently all geth encountered up until the point you meet Legion are considered Geth Heretics, who abandoned the true Geth to join with the Reapers. Legion, being a Geth, is a Tech Expert.

Jack – A Victim of the experiments of a Cerberus facility gone rogue. The experiments objective was to develop a more powerful type of biotic, the most sucessful experiment it seems, was Jack, Subject Zero (she is a female). (her background story reminded me of Wolverine’s Weapon X story)

Jacob – A Cerberus Operative, also involved in Shepard’s ‘reconstruction’. Jacob was an alliance soldier until he realized the people he served were doing nothing in regards to the Collector attacks, therefor he joined Cerberus.

Samara – An Asari(alien race) Ex-Mercenary with incredible Biotic powers, she is now a Justicar, which would be the equivalent of a radical Jedi Knight who would look at no means to achieve it’s ends. (A Justicar is perfectly fine with killing someone if they stand in the way of it’s current assignment, but it is also sworn to protect the innocent).

Grunt – A Genetically created ‘Perfect’ Krogan (alien race). Krogans are brutal fighters, this particular Krogan was created in a Laboratory and genetically engineered to be Perfect, it’s creator however didn’t survive long enough to see his creation.

Mordin – A Solarian (alien race) scientist who participated in questionable scientific research and experiments. He is a tech expert and his role in the series is to develop means to fight with the Collectors more advanced technology.

Thane – A Drell (alien race) assassin trained by the Hanars (another alien race). His skills are nearly unmatched, however he has a contracted a fatal illness, and joins Shepard in hopes of atoning for some of his mistakes in life.

Joker – The Normandy’s helmsman, Joker is a human and has a specific condition that causes his bones to fracture easier than a regular human’s. But he is apparently one of the best pilots in the universe, Joker was present in Mass Effect 1.

EDI – The new Normandy’s Artificial Intelligence Computer. EDI stands for Enhanced Defense Intelligence. EDI plays a key role in helping Joker and the Normandy survive a collector attack in the absense of Shepard. After that the player will notice that Joker develops a friendly relationship with the A.I.

Illusive Man – Cerberus Top Man. Manages the Cerberus group, responsible for bringing Shepard back to life to fight the Reapers. Also responsible for the reconstruction of the Normandy. Depending on ones interpretation of Mass Effect storyline players won’t really figure out wether or not he can be trusted, one thing is certain, he looks at no means to achieve his ends.

Cerberus – An organization which conducts multiple shady operations. During Mass Effect 1, there are several missions where Shepards engages combat with Cerberus due to their unethical practices and scientific experiments.

Geth – A machine race created by the Quarians to act as a work force, however the Geth became self-aware and there was a War on the Quarian homeworld. After becoming aware of the fact that there are apparently two types of Geth one has to wonder who dealt the first blow that began the Morning War (Geth VS Quarian). If simply because Legion, the Geth who serves under Shepard, seems incredibly reasonble and trustworthy. In Mass Effect 1, all the geth Shepard encounters are Hostile, and should thefor be seen as Geth Heretics who were serving the Reapers.

Reapers – An ancient technological race of machines who’s origin is unknown, and who’s main purpose is to harvest the synthetic lifeforms of the universe and their technology every X thousand years. After which they will proceed to lie dormant in deep space for several thousands of years allowing more synthetic life and technology to develop and repeat the cycle. The reapears are the makers of the mass relays and the Citadel, which according to Sovereign (one of the reapers) leads the synthetic civilizations down a set path techonology wise which inevitably leads to their demise.
Basically, the Reapers are the REALLY bad guys.

Collectors – A modified version of Protheans, their only purpose is to serve the Reapers. In Mass Effect 2 the Collectors attack and kidnap several human colonies in order to liquify them to serve as fuel for a Human-Reaper proptotype, which suggests two things:
- Reapers are created and based around the civilizations they conquer.
- The reapers failed to create a Prothean reaper (otherwise the Protheans would have been consumed in the process as opposed to being turned into slaves).

Protheans – The first race to be consumed/enslaved/absorbed by the Reapers, in Mass Effect 1 it is believed for the longest time that most technology in existence (Mass Relays, Citadel, etc) were of Prothean Origin. One of the things that makes Shepard so special is the fact he interacted with a Prothean Database device/relic in Mass Effect 1.

Normandy – Normandy is the ship used by Shepard and his crew During the Mass Effect series. There are currently 2 Normandies, we will refer to them as SR1 and SR2. SR1 was the Normandy used in the first Mass Effect, SR stands for Stealth Reconnaissance, because the Normandy is a stealth ship and is considered the best in the alliance fleet.
In Mass Effect 2 Normandy SR1 is destroyed by a Collector Ship (which is why Joker refers to the Collector ship in the video as “an Old Friend”). Cerberus developed Normandy SR2 to act as Shepard’s base of operations to fight against the collectors. Every single player who plays Mass Effect should develop a strong connection to the Normandy, which makes should make the apparence of SR2 after witnessing the complete destruction of SR1, quite a sentimental experience (or maybe that’s just me). The SR2 features several improvements over SR1, and was made possible because Cerberus took an active role in helping the Alliance build SR1, which allowed them to copy and improve upon SR1 design to create SR2.

Mass Relays – Think of them as portals, they are what allows ships to jump between systems using their FTL Drives. Created by the Reapers to guide alien civilizations evolution towards the usage of Element Zero and also to establish the Citadel as center point of the universe.

Omega 4 Relay – This particular relay allows one to travel to the Collector’s System, with the usage of correct technology.

Adept – There are several character classes available for you to play in Mass Effect, in this particular video, my shepard is an Adept, which is a character that focuses on the usage of Biotic Powers, which are powers similar to Telekinetics that allow one to manipulate objects or enemies at a distance. You will see me use powers like Pull, which allows me levitate enemies leaving them helpless, Throw, which allows me to hurl enemies off cliffs or against walls, Warp, which deals damage on enemies Barriers or Armor, Singularity which creates black holes, etc.
Other character types might be a mix of biotic powers and tech, or more powerfull with guns, etc.
Your class choice also determines your primary weapons, mine are Sub-machine gun and Pistol.

Biotics – Biotics, as explained above, are a power similar to telekinetics, however you’re required to be implanted with Bio-Amp devices and several other conditions must be met in order for someone to become a biotic. (except for Asari, they are biotic-capable at birth).

Tech – Tech is obviously techonology, I just placed it here to explain that these are the two main abilities in the game that define the character classes, a character can be tech oriented, biotic oriented, a mix of both, or even a mix between tech and physical abilities or biotic and physical abilites, etc.

One thought on “Mass Effect 2: Final Moments (part 2)”

Can I recommend NOT using that save game since Garrus is a playable character in ME3.

And yes, any non-loyal squadmates will die or get someone else killed. I believe Jack only works if you buy her upgrade too.

Speaking about the game, I found ME2 was a much better game then ME1 even though a lot of the RPG mechanics were stripped away. The camera work, dramatics storytelling, cutscenes and truthfully, combat was much better in ME2.